We are committed to breaking down language barriers to bike repair in East Oakland.

Our mission: to bring low-cost, participatory, Spanish-language bike repair services to East Oakland.

The San Francisco Bay Area - an area that thrives with the help of large Latino immigrant populations and that is bursting with bike culture - until now has had no bike education facilities or community bike garages targeted to Latino immigrants.

Isn't that kind of shocking? Latino immigrants make up a large segment of the bike-commuting community, even where there are still no bike lanes. Day-laborer populations in particular ride their bikes more than almost any other identifiable sector of our society, and yet have the least resources targeted toward them to help them in their cycling needs.

A community bike garage is on its way in the Fruitvale area of Oakland (at 4848 International Boulevard). With the help of several non-profits, the space has been built, most tools purchased, and regular open hours are established.

It's time to fill the space with bicycle love from all kinds of people.

Right now we are focused on improving the shop space, starting up weekly open-hours, and programming our earn-a-bike system. You can email if you would like to get involved.

The vision for the garage is fluid. Imagine:

• Access to a wide range of well organized bike repair tools
• Instruction/guidance to anyone who comes by - all offered in a primarily Spanish-speaking environment
• Access to reused bike parts
• "Real-life" chances to practice Spanish or English with native speakers
• Spanish-language education about safe bicycle riding and the laws of bicycling.
• Membership-based decision making that supports leadership development and cooperation across diversity
• Valuing and serving folks who are frequently alienated and de-humanized in our society
• Off-site skill sharing, bringing tools and expertise to the sidewalks in day-laborer hiring zones where folks might be waiting for work.
• Some sort of earn-a-bike (with helmet) for little-to-no monetary cost
• Entrepeneurial support for freelance bike mechanics

In order to make this happen, there is lots to do

• Decorate, organize, and generally make the workshop a welcoming, vibrant place with art and creativity.
• Offer bike repair teaching more times per week/month.
• Put on events of all kinds!
• Outreach to local community groups, schools, churches, anywhere there's life in East Oakland
• Establish relationships with sources of used bikes and parts.

The shop is hosted under the back porch of the Oakland Catholic Worker house (ie, el Obrero Catholico de Oakland), at 4848 International Blvd. Other supporting organizations include the East Bay Bicycle Coalition, Street Level Health, Centro Legal de La Raza, and Cycles of Change.

The name of the house will not appeal a lot of people who have atheist/agnostic/anti-religion/anti-institutional beliefs, and sadly we may lose a fair number of bike-loving, politically organizing, communally-minded people, who probably do not know what the Catholic Worker network is. The organization is a radical liberal activist network based in supporting its participants in redistributing waste-stream-diverted food and often in taking non-violent direct actions, leading to their arrests. It is not a sanctioned part of the Catholic Church. The Oakland Catholic Worker specifically is a shelter and nexus for services to Latino economic refugees, one that is well-known within the Oakland day-laborer communities.